The termination of former Chief Election Officer (CEO) Keith Lowenfield’s Personal Assistant, Duarte Hetsberger is attracting some controversy at GECOM.
Current Guyana Elections Commission (GECOM) CEO Vishnu Persaud terminated Hetsberger’s contract effective December 31, 2021, and the report came up at GECOM’s statutory meeting on Tuesday.
Hetsberger has been a controversial figure at the Elections Commission and was questioned by the Police in relation to the attempt to alter the results of the March 2020 general elections. He was however never charged unlike his former boss Lowenfield who is before a city magistrate on trial.
Hetsberger, who is a member of the Guyana Defence Force had been seconded to the Guyana Elections Commission (GECOM) for several years. He served as Returning Officer for Georgetown during the 2016 and 2018 Local Government Elections.
His contract would have expired on December 8, 2021, but as a final act in office, Lowenfield extended it for three years. Lowenfield’s contract was terminated in August of 2021.
According to government-nominated Commissioner Sase Gunraj, the Commission’s Chairperson retired Justice Claudette Singh had taken a decision to allow the incoming CEO to make the decision as to whether to retain Hetsberger or transfer him to another department.
“A personal assistant is peculiar to the officeholder. He (the new CEO) would have to determine if he wants to keep him or move him to another department or whatever. When the man (Vishnu Persaud) came he offered to move or reassign him but he didn’t accept that offer,” Gunraj told Stabroek News during a brief telephone interview.
He added after Hetsberger refused to be reassigned, the CEO found that all the computers in his possession were wiped and an investigation was launched.
“We found that all his computers were wiped and after an investigation was carried out and he was given an opportunity to be heard and he said some stupidness …his contract was terminated on December 31,” he explained.
Inconclusive
However, Opposition-nominated Commissioner Vincent Alexander has a different view on what transpired at the GECOM meeting on Tuesday.
“The question of Mr Hetsberger’s termination was raised and as far as I am concerned the matter was not finalized because we raised questions in relation to the authority of the Commission to ratify such termination and the fact that at the previous meeting the Chairperson had brought to our attention that there was some correspondence which she would circulate but we did not get. The Chairperson did not pronounce finitely on the matter at yesterday’s meeting. So for all intents and purposes the matter as far as I am concerned is inconclusive,” Alexander related during a telephone interview with this newspaper yesterday.
He added that he found the narrative, being peddled in certain sections of the media and being fed by the government-nominated Commissioners, that Hetsberger was dismissed for wiping computers to be disconcerting. He explain-ed that CEO Persaud terminated Hetsberger with payment in lieu of notice and that no reason was given for his termination. He criticised the government-appointed Commissioners for peddling otherwise and misinforming the nation.
“I find it mischievous of them to go to the public and say that he was dismissed on the suspicion of removing data. Nobody has been able to say what specific data is been referred to because Mr Hetsberger’s computer is not the place where GECOM’s data, so to speak, is being stored. So we do not know what data they (government-appointed Commissioners) are talking about. It is true the computer was cleaned but GECOM doesn’t have a system which says that Mr Hetsberger was the custodian of the data and so what data are we talking about and so those are the matters that are still on the table for a final determination,” Alexander argued.
The long-time Commissioner further stated that he removed himself from a finance meeting of the Commission yesterday in protest at the government-appointed Commissioners’ misleading comments to the press. He said that the meeting was then cancelled owing to the lack of a quorum.
Additionally, Alexander said that his issue is not with the fact that Hetsberger was terminated rather it is with the attempt by the government side to “malign a staff of the Commission”.
“We had agreed that since he was the PA when the new CEO is appointed that he would make a determination on whether he wanted him to stay or not. He has that prerogative. He terminated his contract under, I think, clause 10 which specifies that he can be terminated without cause with due notice or payment in lieu of notice.
So that is the provision in which he was terminated. There is no reference to any matter. It is a termination in a manner of which clause 10 provides for termination. There was a report about a computer being found to be cleaned, not having information on it but that was not used in his official termination. What was used in his official termination was clause 10 of his contract which does not reference cause,” Alexander explained.
GECOM is looking to fill a number of vacancies and Hetsberger has been shortlisted for two – ACEO and Logistics Manager. It is unclear how the Commission would now proceed with that.
